Lincoln's  View  of  Agriculture-1859 

(with  some  Projections  by  Hopkins — 1909) 

The  story  is  told  that  Preacher  Jones,  of  a  southern  country 
church,  was  in  the  habit  of  quoting  liberally  from  the  great  pulpit 
orators,  without  giving  very  much  credit  for  the  quotations.  A  bro- 
ther of  the  congregation  who  boasted  some  literary  attainment,  and 
who  recognized  the  quotations,  took  a  front  seat  one  Sunday  morning, 
and  at  the  proper  time  he  wrote  something  in  a  note  book  and  said  to 
himself  above  a  whisper:  "That's  Beecher";  and  a  few  minutes  later, 
he  added:  "That's  Lyman  Abbott". 

After  another  notation  and  a  similar  remark,  distinctly  audible  to 
most  of  the  congregation.  Preacher  Jones  stopped  short  and  said:  "I 
want  it  understood  by  one  gentleman  in  this  aujience,  that  I'm  doin' 
the  preachin'  for  this  here  church". 

In  the  brief  and  awful  silence  which  followed,  the  literary  brother 
quietly  made  another  notation,  and  was  heard  to  whisper  to  himself: 
"That  is  Jones". 

In  the  paper  I  have  prepared  upon  Lincoln's  Yiew  of  Agriculture, 
I  have  included  much  of  Lincoln's  own  language,  taken  from  his  Ag- 
ricultural Address,  delivered  fifty  years  ago  before  the  Wisconsin 
State  Agricultural  Society.  On  paper  I  have  made  the  proper  use  of 
quotation  marks;  bat,  if  I  sometimes  fail  to  state  just  where  these 
quotation  marks  are,  I  think  this  audience  will  have  no  difficulty  in 
distinguishing  the  language  of  Lincoln  from  that  of— Jones;  and 
you  will  doubtless  observe,  too,  that,  commonly  in  his  own  remarks, 
Jones  is  thinking  Lincoln's  thoughts  after  him. 

"Farmers, as  a  class are  neither  better  nor 

worse  than  other  people but their  interest  is  the 

largest  interest.  It  also  follows  that  that  interest  is  most 
worthy  of  all  to  be  cherished  and  cultivated— and  if  there  be 
inevitable  conflict  between  that  interest  and  any  other,  the 

other  should  yield." 

While  Lincoln  acknowledged  that  the  farmers'  interest  was  of 
greatest  importance  because  at  that  time  they  represented  the  most 
numerous  class,  he  also  recognized  the  permanent  success  of  Amer- 
ican agriculture  as  the  foundation  upon  which  must  rest  our  ultimate 
national  success. 


"My  first  suggestion  is  an  inquiry  as  to  the  effect  of 
greater  thoroughness  in  all  the  departments  of  Agriculture 
than  now  prevails  in  the  Northwest — perhaps  I  might  say  in 
America.  To  speak  entirely  within  bounds,  it  is  known  that 
fifty  bushels  of  wheat,  or   one   hundred  bushels  of  Indian 

corn,  can  be   produced   from  an  acre Take  fifty  of 

wheat,  and  one  hundred  of  corn,  to  be  the  possibility,  and 
compare  it  with  the  actual  crops  of  the  country.  Many  years 
ago  I  saw  it  stated  in  a  patent-office  report,  that  eighteen 
bushels  (of  wheat)  was  the  average  crop  throughout  the 
United  States. " 

These  are  Lincoln's  words,  spoken  fifty  years  ago.  The  average 
yield  of  wheat  in  the  United  States  has  now  fallen  to  13.7  bushels 
per  acre,  as  a  ten  year  average,  1899-1908. 

"As  to  Indian  corn,  and  indeed,  most  other  crops,  the 
case  has  not  been  much  better It  is  true  that  hereto- 
fore we  have  had  better  crops  with  no  better  cultivation,  but 
I  believe  it  is  also  true  that  the  soil  has  never  been  pushed 
up  to  one-half  of  its  capacity. 

"What  would  be  the  effect  upon  the  farming  interest  to 
push  the  soil  up  to  something  near  its  full  capacity.  Unques- 
tionably it  will  take  more  labor  to  produce  fifty  bushels  (of 
wheat)  from  an  acre  than  it  will  to  produce  ten  bushels  from 
the  same  acre;  but  will  it  take  more  labor  to  produce  fifty 
bushels  from  one  acre  than  from  five?  Unquestionably 
thorough  cultivation  will  require  more  labor  to  the  acre;  but 
will  it  require  more  to  the  bushel?  If  it  should  require  just 
as  much  to  the  bushel,  there  are  some  probable,  and  several 
certain,  advantages  in  favor  of  the  thorough  practice.  It  is 
probable  it  would  develop  those  unknown  causes  which  of 
late  years  have  cut  down  our  crops  below  their  former  aver- 
age. It  is  almost  certain,  I  think,  that  by  deeper  plowing, 
analysis  of  soils,  experiments  with  manures  and  varieties  of 
seeds,  observance  of  reasons,  and  the  like,  these  causes 
would  be  discovered  and  remedied." 
Lincoln?    Yes,  that's  Lincoln. 


"It  is  certain  that  thorough  cultivation  would  spare  half , 
or  more  than  half,  the  cost  of  land,  simply  because  the  same 
product  would  be  got  from  half  or  from  less  than  half,  the 
quantity  of  land.  This  proposition  is  self-evident,  and  can 
be  made  no  plainer  by  repetitions  or  illustrations.  The  cost 
of  land  is  a  great  item,  even  in  new  countries,  and  it  con- 
stantly grows  greater  and  greater,  in  comparison  with  other 
items,  as  the  country  grows  older. 

"It  also  would  spare  the  making  and  maintaining  of  in- 
closures  for  the  same,  whether  these  inclosures  should  be 
hedges,  ditches,  or  fences.  This  again  is  a  heavy  item — 
heavy  at  first,  and  heavy  in  its  continual  demand  for  repairs. 
I  remember  once  being  greatly  astonished  by  an  apparently 
authentic  exhibition  of  the  proportion  the  cost  of  an  inclosure 
bears  to  all  the  other  expenses  of  the  farmer,  though  I  can- 
not remember  exactly  what  that  proportion  was.  Any  far- 
mer, if  he  will,  can  ascertain  it  in  his  own  case  for  himself. 

"Again,  a  great  amount  of  locomotion  is  spared  by 
thorough  cultivation.  Take  fifty  bushels  of  wheat  ready  for 
harvest,  standing  upon  a  single  acre,  and  it  can  be  harvested 
in  any  of  the  known  ways  with  less  than  half  the  labor  which 
would  be  required  if  it  were  spread  over  five  acres.  This 
would  be  true  if  cut  by  the  old  hand- sickle;  true  to  a  greater 
extent,  if  by  the  scythe  and  cradle;  and  to  a  still  greater  ex- 
tent, if  by  the  machines  now  in  use.  These  machines  are 
chiefly  valuable  as  a  means  of  substituting  animal  power  for 
the  power  of  men  in  this  branch  of  farm- work.  In  the  high- 
est degree  of  perfection  yet  reached  in  applying  the  horse- 
power to  harvesting,  fully  nine-tenths  of  the  power  is  ex- 
pended by  the  animal  in  carrying  himself  and  dragging  the 
machine  over  the  field,  leaving  certainly  not  more  than  one- 
tenth  to  be  applied  directly  to  the  only  end  of  the  whole 
operation — the  gathering  in  of  the  grain,  and  clipping  of  the 
straw.  When  grain  is  very  thin  on  the  ground  it  is  always 
more  or  less  intermingled  with  weeds,  chess,  and  the  like, 
and  a  large  part  of  the  power  is  expended  in  cutting  these. 


It  is  plain  that  when  the  crop  is  very  thick  upon  the  ground, 
a  large  proportion  of  the  power  is  directly  applied  to  gather- 
ing in  and  cutting  it;  and  the  sraaller  to  that  which  is  totally 
useless  as  an  end.  And  what  I  have  said  of  harvesting  is 
true  in  a  greater  or  less  degree  of  mowing,  plowing,  gather- 
ing in  of  crops  generally,  and  indeed  of  almost  all  farm- 
work, 

"The  effect  of  thorough  cultivation  upon  the  farmer's 
own  mind,  and  in  reaction  through  his  mind  back  upon  his 
business,  is  perhaps  quite  equal  to  any  other  of  its  effects. 
Every  man  is  proud  of  what  he  does  well,  and  no  man  is 
proud  of  that  he  does  not  well.  With  the  former  his  heart 
is  in  his  work,  and  he  will  do  twice  as  much  of  it  with  less 
fatigue;  the  latter  he  performs  a  little  imperfectly,  looks  at 
it  in  disgust,  turns  from  it,  and  imagines  himself  exceedingly 
tired — the  little  he  has  done  comes  to  nothing  for  want  of 
finishing, 

"The  man  who  produces  a  good  full  crop  will  scarcely 
ever  let  any  part  of  it  go  to  waste;  he  will  keep  up  the  in- 
closure  about  it,  and  allow  neither  man  nor  beast  to  trespass 
upon  it;  he  will  gather  it  in  due  season,  and  store  it  in  per- 
fect security.  Thus  he  labors  with  satisfaction,  and  saves 
himself  the  whole  fruit  of  his  labor.  The  other,  starting 
with  no  purpose  for  a  full  crop,  labors  less,  and  with  less 
satisfaction,  allows  his  fences  to  fall,  and  cattle  to  trespass, 
gathers  not  in  due  season,  or  not  at  all.  Thus  the  labor  he 
has  performed  is  wasted  away,  little  by  little,  till  in  the  end 
he  derives  scarcely  anything  from  it. 

"The  ambition  for  broad  acres  leads  to  poor  farming, 
even  with  men  of  energy,  I  scarcely  ever  knew  a  mammoth 
farm  to  sustain  itself,  much  less  to  return  a  profit  upon  the 
outlay,  I  have  more  than  once  known  a  man  to  spend  a  re- 
spectable fortune  upon  one,  fail,  and  leave  it,  and  then  some 
man  of  modest  aim  get  a  small  fraction  of  the  ground,  and 
make  a  good  living  upon  it.  Mammoth  farms  are  like  tools 
or  weapons  which  are  too  heavy  to  be  handled;  ere  long  they 
are  thrown  aside  at  a  great  loss." 


"The  prudent,  penniless  beginner  in  the  world  labors 
for  wages  awhile,  saves  a  surplus  with  which  to  buy  tools  or 
land  for  himself,  then  labors  on  his  own  account  another 
while,  and  at  length  hires  another  new  beginner  to  help  him. 
This,  says  its  advocates,  is  free  labor — the  just,  and  gener- 
ous, and  prosperous  system,  which  opens  the  way  for  all, 
gives  hope  to  all,  and  energy,  and  progress,  and  improve- 
ment of  condition  to  all.  If  any  continue  through  life  in  the 
condition  of  the  hired  laborer,  it  is  not  the  fault  of  the  sys- 
tem, but  because  of  either  a  dependent  nature  which  prefers 
it,  or  improvidence,  folly,  or  singular  misfortune.  I  have 
said  this  much  about  the  elements  of  labor  generally,  as  in- 
troductory to  the  consideration  of  a  new  phase  which  that 
element  is  in  process  of  assuming.  The  old  general  rule 
was  that  educated  people  did  not  perform  manual  labor. 
They  managed  to  eat  their  bread,  leaving  the  toil  of  produc- 
ing it  to  the  uneducated.  This  was  not  an  insupportable 
evil  to  the  working  bees,  so  long  as  the  class  of  drones  re- 
mained very  small.  But  now,  especially  in  these  free  States, 
nearly  all  are  educated — quite  too  nearly  all  to  leave  the  la- 
bor of  the  uneducated  in  any  wise  adequate  to  the  support  of 
the  whole.  It  follows  from  this  that  henceforth  educated 
people  must  labor.  Otherwise,  education  itself  would  be- 
come a  positive  and  intolerable  evil.  No  country  can  sustain 
in  idleness  more  than  a  small  percentage  of  its  numbers. 
The  great  majority  must  labor  at  something  productive. 
From  these  premises  the  problem  springs,  'how  can  labor 
and  education  be  the  most  satisfactorily  combined?' 

"By  the  'mud-sill'  theory  it  is  assumed  that  labor  and 
education  are  incompatible,  and  any  practical  combination  of 
them  impossible.  According  to  that  theory,  a  blind  horse 
upon  a  treadmill  is  a  perfect  illustration  of  what  a  laborer 
should  be— all  the  better  for  being  blind,  that  he  could  not 
kick  understandingly.  According  to  that  theory,  the  educa- 
tion of  laborers  is  not  only  useless  but  pernicious  and  danger- 
ous. In  fact,  it  is,  in  some  sort,  deemed  a  misfortune  that 
laborers  should  have  heads  at  all.     Those  same  heads  are  re- 


6 

garded  as  explosive  materials,  only  to  be  safely  kept  in  damp 
places  as  far  as  possible  from  that  peculiar  sort  of  fire  which 
ignites  them.  A  Yankee  who  could  invent  a  strong-handed 
man  without  a  head  would  receive  the  everlasting  gratitude 
of  the  'mud-siir  advocates. 

"But  free  labor  says,  'No',  Free  labor  argues  that  as 
the  Author  of  man  makes  every  individual  with  one  head 
and  one  pair  of  hands,  it  was  probably  intended  that  heads 
and  hands  should  cooperate  as  friends,  and  that  that  parti- 
cular head  should  direct  and  control  that  pair  of  hands.  As 
each  man  has  one  mouth  to  be  fed,  and  one  pair  of  hands  to 
furnish  food,  it  was  probably  intended  that  that  particular 
pair  of  hands  should  feed  that  particular  mouth — that  each 
head  is  the  natural  guardian,  director,  and  protector  of  the 
hands  and  mouth  inseparably  connected  with  it;  and  that  be- 
ing so,  every  head  should  be  cultivated  and  improved  by 
whatever  will  add  to  its  capacity  for  performing  its  charge. 
In  one  word,  free  labor  insists  on  universal  education." 

"This  leads  to  the  further  reflection  that  ng  other  human 
occupation  opens  so  wide  a  field  for  the  profitable  and  agree- 
able combination  of  labor  with  cultivated  thought  as  agricul- 
ture. I  know  nothing  so  pleasant  to  the  mind  as  the  dis- 
covery of  anything  that  is  at  once  new  and  valuable — 
nothing  that  so  lightens  and  sweetens  toil  as  the  hopeful  pur- 
suit of  such  discovery.  And  how  vast  and  how  varied  a 
field  is  agriculture  for  such  discovery!  The  mind,  already 
trained  to  thought  in  the  country  school,  or  higher  school, 
cannot  fail  to  find  there  an  exhaustless  source  of  enjoyment. 
Every  blade  of  grass  is  a  study;  and  to  produce  two  where 
there  was  but  one  is  both  a  profit  and  pleasure.  And  not 
grass  alone,  but  soils,  seeds,  and  season — hedges,  ditches, 
and  fences — draining,  droughts,  and  irrigation — plowing, 
hoeing  and  harrowing — reaping,  mowing,  and  threshing — 
saving  crops,  pests  of  crops,  diseases  of  crops  and  what  will 
prevent  or  cure  them — implements,  utensils,  and  machines, 
their   relative   merits,    and    how  to   improve   them — hogs, 


horses,  and  cattle — sheep,  goats,  and  poultry — trees,  shrubs, 
fruits,  plants,  and  flowers — the  thousand  things  of  which 
these  are  specimens — each  a  world  of  study  within  itself. 

"In  all  this,  book-learning  is  available.  A  capacity  and 
taste  for  reading  gives  access  to  whatever  has  already  been 
discovered  by  others.  It  is  the  key,  or  one  of  the  keys,  to 
the  already  solved  problems.  And  not  only  so:  it  gives  a 
relish  and  facility  for  successfully  pursuing  the  unsolved  ones. 
The  rudiments  of  science  are  available,  and  highly  available. 
Some  knowledge  of  botany  assists  in  dealing  with  the  vege- 
table world — with  all  growing  crops.  Chemistry  assists  in 
the  analysis  of  soils,  selection  and  application  of  manures, 
and  in  numerous  others  ways.  The  mechanical  branches  of 
natural  philosophy  are  ready  help  in  almost  everything, 
but  especially  in  reference  to  implements  and  machinery. 

"The  thought  recurs  that  education — cultivated  thought 
— can  best  be  combined  with  agricultural  labor,  or  any  labor, 
on  the  principal  of  thorough  work;  that  careless,  half  per- 
formed, slovenly  work  makes  no  place  for  such  combination; 
and  through  work,  again,  renders  sufficient  the  smallest 
quantity  of  ground  to  each  man;  and  this  again,  conforms  to 
what  must  occur  in  a  world  less  inclined  to  wars  and  more 
devoted  to  the  arts  and  peace  than  heretofore.  Population 
must  increase  rapidly,  more  rapidly  than  in  former  times, 
and  ere  long  the  most  valuable  of  all  arts  will  be  the  art  of 
deriving  a  comfortable  subsistence  from  the  smallest  area  of 
soil.  No  community  whose  every  member  possesses  this 
art,  can  ever  be  the  victim  of  oppression  in  any  of  its  forms. 
Such  community  will  be  alike  independent  of  crowned  kings, 

money  kings,  and  land  kings." 

The  story  is  told  that,  when  the  ark  began  to  float,  a  skeptfc, 
worthy  to  represent  the  Emerald  Isle,  hung  on  the  outside  till  Noah 
rapped  his  fingers  and  made  him  let  go;  whereupon,  as  he  swam  to 
higher  land,  he  shouted  back: 

"Go  long  wid  ye;  it's  only  a  little  shower  annyway". 

If  I  say  to  you  that  the  most  important  material  problem  of  this 
Union  is  to  discover  and  to  adopt  systems  of  farming  that  will  not 
only  maintain  but  increase  the  productive  capacity  of  our  so-called 


8 

rich  land,  some  of  you  would  agree  with  me;  but  when  I  say  that,  if 
our  future  shall  be  a  continuation  of  our  past  agricultural  history, 
famine  and  starvation  in  America  are  easily  possible  for  your  children's 
children  in  the  twentieth  century,  who  will  believe  my  report? 

Moralists  sometimes  tell  us  that  the  fall  of  the  Babylonian  Empire, 
the  fall  of  the  Grecian  Empire,  and  the  fall  of  the  Roman  Empire, 
were  all  due  to  the  development  of  pride  and  immorality  among  those 
peoples;  whereas  we  believe  that  civilization  tends  rather  toward 
peace,  security,  and  higher  citizenship.  Is  not  the  chief  explanation 
for  the  ultimate  and  successive  fall  of  those  great  empires  to  be  found 
in  the  exhausted  or  wasted  agricultural  resources  of  the  country? 

The  land  that  once  flowed  with  milk  and  honey  might  then  sup- 
port a  mighty  empire,  with  independent  resources  sufficient  for  times 
of  great  emergencies,  but  now  that  land  seems  almost  barren  and 
supports  a  few  wandering  bands  of  Arabs. 

The  power  and  world  influence  of  a  nation  must  pass  away  with 
the  passing  of  material  resources,  for  poverty  is  helpless;  and  Igno- 
rance is  the  inevitable  result  of  continued  poverty.  Only  the  pros- 
perous can  afford  education  or  trained  intelligence. 

Old  land  is  poorer  than  new  land.  There  are  exceptions,  but  this 
is  the  rule.    This  fact  is  known  and  recognized  by  all  men. 

What  does  it  all  mean?  It  means  that  the  practice  of  the  past 
and  present  art  of  agriculture  leads  toward  land  ruin,— not  only  in 
China,  where  famine  and  starvation  are  common,  notwithstanding 
that  thousands  and  thousands  of  Chinese  are  employed  constantly  in 
saving  every  particle  of  fertilizing  material,  even  gathering  the  hu- 
man excrements  from  every  house  and  by-place  in  village  and  country, 
as  carefully  as  our  farmers  gather  honey  from  the  hives;  not  only  in 
India  where  vast  multitudes  of  people  suffer  want  and  hunger;  not 
only  in  Russia  where  famine  is  frequent;  but,  likewise  in  the  United 
States  of  America,  the  present  practice  of  the  art  of  agriculture 
tends  toward  land  ruin. 

Nations  rise  and  fall;  so  does  the  productive  power  of  vast  areas 
of  land.  Better  drainage,  better  seed,  better  implements,  and  more 
thorough  tillage,  all  tend  toward  larger  crops,  but  they  also  tend  to- 
ward ultimate  land  ruin,  for  the  removal  of  larger  crops  only  hastens 
soil  depletion. 

Do  you  ask  how  it  is  that  Rhode  Island  and  Connecticut  produce 
more  corn  per  acre  than  Illinois?  Because  Rhode  Island  and  Con- 
necticut make  large  use  of  manures  produced  in  part  from  Illinois  corn 
and  oats. 

H  is  well  to  know,  and  well  to  remember,  lest  we  be  deceived  by 
false  arguments,  that  the  corn  acreage  of  Rhode  Island  is  less  than 
half  of  one  township;  that  the  corn  acreage  of  Rhode  Island  and  Con- 


9 

necticut  combined  is  less  than  one-tenth  of  Champaigrn  county,  and 
that  the  total  corn  acreage  of  Maine,  New  Hampshire,  Vermont 
Massachusetts,  Connecticut,  Khode  Island,  New  York,  Pennsylvania, 
New  Jersey,  Delaware,  and  Maryland,  all  combined,  is  less  than  the 
corn  area  of  Georgia.  The  acreage  of  corn  in  Illinois  is  twice  as  large, 
and  the  average  yield  three  times  as  large,  as  that  of  Georgia. 

Do  you  ask  why  the  average  yield  of  wheat  in  England  is  more 
than  30  bushels  per  acre  while  that  of  the  United  States  is  less  than 
14  bushels?  Because  England  produces  only  50  millions  bushels  of 
wheat,  while  she  imports  200  million  bushels  of  wheat,  100  million 
bushels  of  corn,  nearly  a  billion  pounds  of  oil  cake,  and  other  food 
stuffs,  from  which  large  quantities  of  manure  are  made;  and,  in  addi- 
tion to  this,  England  imports  and  uses  much  phosphate  and  other 
commercial  plant  food  materials. 

Germany  imports  great  quantities  of  wheat,  corn,  oil  cake,  and 
phosphates,  and  thus  enriclies  her  cultivated  soil,  and  Germany's 
principal  export  is  2  billion  pounds  of  sugar,  which  contains  no  plant 
food  of  value. 

Denmark  produces  4  million  bushels  of  wheat,  imports  5  million 
bushels  of  wheat,  15  million  bushels  of  corn,  800  million  pounds  of 
oilcake,  andother  foodstuffs,  phosphate,  etc.,  and  exports  175  million 
pounds  of  butter,  which  contains  no  plant  food  of  value,  but  sells  for 
much  more  than  these  imports  cost. 

Phosphate  is  the  only  fertilizing  material  the  American  farmer 
will  ever  need  to  buy  for  use  in  establishing  permanent  systems  of  ag- 
riculture on  our  normal  soils,  and,  from  our  limited  deposits,  we  allow 
a  million  tons  of  our  best  phosphate  to  be  exported  annually  for 
which  we  receive  less  than  five  million  dollars  at  the  mines,  while  the 
additional  corn  that  this  phosphate  would  ultimately  produce,  if  ap- 
plied to  our  soil,  would  be  worth  more  than  six  hundred  million 
dollars. 

To  bring  about  the  adoption  of  systems  of  farming  that  will  re- 
store our  depleted  Eastern  and  Southern  soils  and  that  will  maintain 
or  increase  the  productive  power  of  our  remaining  fertile  lands  of  the 
Great  Central  West,  where  we  are  now  producing  half  of  the  total 
corn  crop  of  the  entire  world,  is  not  only  the  most  Important  mate- 
rial problem  of  the  United  States;  but  to  bring  tliis  about  is  worthy 
of,  and  will  require,  the  best  thought  of  the  most  influential  men  of 
America. 

In  these  latter  days  there  is  much  talk  of  conserving  our  natural 
resources,  but  90  percent  of  the  talk  is  directed  toward  10  percent  of 
the  resources.  Without  a  prosperous  agriculture  in  America  there 
can  be  no  permanent  prosperity  for  our  American  institutions.  While 
some  small  countries  can  support  themselves  by  conducting  trade, 


10 

commerce,  and  manufacture,  for  other  countries,  American  agricul- 
ture must  not  only  be  self-supporting,  but.  in  large  degrees,  agricul- 
ture must  support  our  other  great  industries. 

Without  agriculture,  the  coal  and  iron  would  remain  in  the  earth, 
the  forest  would  be  left  uncut,  the  railroads  would  be  abandoned,  the 
cities  depopulated,  and  the  wooded  lands  and  water  ways  would  again 
be  used  only  for  hunting  and  fishing.  Sliall  we  not  remember,  for  ex- 
ample, that  the  coal  mine  yields  a  single  harvest-one  crop-and  is 
then  forever  abandoned:  while  the  soil  must  yield  a  hundred— yes,  a 
thousand  crops,  and  even  then  it  must  be  richer  and  more  productive 
than  at  the  beginning,  if  those  who  come  after  us  are  to  continue  to 
multiply  and  replenish  the  earth. 

Even  the  best  possible  system  of  soil  improvement,  we  must  admit, 
is  not  the  absolute  and  final  solution  of  this,  the  most  stupendous 
problem  of  the  United  States.  If  war  gives  way  to  peace  and  pesti- 
lence to  science,  then  the  time  will  come  when  the  soils  of  America 
shall  reach  thelimit  of  the  highest  productive  power  possible  to  be 
permanently  maintained;  and  before  that  limit  is  reached,  if  power, 
progress,  and  plenty  are  to  continue  in  our  beloved  country,  there 
must  be  developed  and  enforced  the  law  of  the  survival  of  the  fit; 
otherwise,  there  is  no  ultimate  future  for  America  different  from 
that  of  China,  India,  and  Russia,  the  only  great  agricultural  coun- 
tries comparable  with  the  United  States.  An  enlightened  humanity 
must  grant  to  all  the  right  to  live,  but  the  reproduction  and  perpetu- 
ation of  the  unfit  can  never  be  an  absolute  and  inalienable  right. 

"It  is  said  an  Eastern  monarch  once  charged  his  wise 
men  to  invent  him  a  sentence  to  be  ever  in  view,  and  which 
should  be  true  and  appropriate  in  all  times  and  situations. 
They  presented  him  the  words,  'And  this,  too,  shall  pass 
away.'  How  much  it  expresses!  How  chastening  in  the 
hour  of  pride!  How  consoling  in  the  depths  of  affliction! 
'And  this,  too,  shall  pass  away'.  And  yet,  let  us  hope,  it  is 
not  quite  true.  Let  us  hope,  rather,  that  by  the  best  culti- 
vation of  the  physical  world  beneath  and  around  us,  and  the 
best  intellectual  and  moral  world  within  us,  we  shall  secure 
an  individual,  social,  and  political  prosperity  and  happiness, 
whose  course  shall  be  onward  and  upward,  and  which,  while 
the  earth  endures,  shall  not  pass  away." 


I 


